


Journey

by Percygranger



Series: Dragon & Liaison 'Verse Snippets [1]
Category: Dragonback Series - Timothy Zahn
Genre: Aliens, Domestic, Dragons, F/M, Fluff, Gen, Interspecies Romance, Mid-Canon, Sort Of
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-20
Updated: 2020-05-20
Packaged: 2021-03-03 00:34:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 958
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24295930
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Percygranger/pseuds/Percygranger
Summary: Parts of Draycos's sisters and their symbionts days, before they arrived and met Jack.
Relationships: E'Tany (OFC)/Chauth (OMC), Trit (OFC) & Kal'chei (OFC)
Series: Dragon & Liaison 'Verse Snippets [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1753984
Comments: 3
Kudos: 1





	Journey

She wavered, another rush of tiredness sapping the coordination from her limbs. A yawn forced its way out of her mouth, and she blinked hard, several times, looking away from the computer. 

“Gotta finish,” she muttered, intent on the glowing screen. 

The running lights were low, indicating a localized night, her day for now. They had yet to leave the concept of days behind entirely, one of the few last gasps of a formerly planet-bound species. Or two, actually.

“You should get up and move around,” a voice interrupted Kal’chei’s bleary focus on a mid-range between the screen and her eyes. She looked slowly over to find her symbiont staring at her, claws hooked in the metal mesh on the side of their area, head swivelled to be level with hers instead of sideways. The twist of it emphasized the reptilian nature of her symbiont, her scales glittering barely blue and green in the dim light. 

“Trit,” Kal’chei sighed, then rethought her instinctive protest, “yes, that’s a good idea.” She pushed herself up, steadying herself as her internal fluids restabilized. Holding out an arm as she went by, Kal’chei took the sudden addition and disappearance of weight as Trit flowed up her arm with barely a pause in her stride. 

“Report?” She asked. 

“All systems normal, like they’ve been for the past two weeks…” Trit said, sounding vaguely bored, the Standard words of the galaxy they were heading towards sounding strange on her tongue. 

Kal’chei agreed, but tried not to show it. The shine had quickly rubbed off this job, taking turns with a limited crew, manning a ceaselessly boring vista, making sure the computer didn’t suddenly decide to kill them all. They’d begun speaking to each other only in Standard in order to help combat it, as well as improve their own respective fluencies. 

An unexpected comet or computer error would be the icing on the cake, an interesting Standard idiom. To be killed by the universe after fighting so hard. Kal’chei supposed they all were going to die anyways at some point, but she hoped by that point to have reproduced, or helped foster a childling or two, at least. Trit’s were sure to be a handful. Leaving some mark of memory and biology behind had become important to her as they’d fought the war. She wanted their species not just to survive, but thrive. Hopefully, they could soon, in a new galaxy.

“Only...twenty more to go.” Kal’chei had to work hard to get that calculation, math in a foreign language was always tricky. 

“If there’s more than four weeks, you count months,” Trit reminded her. 

“Right, and twelve months is a year. So, four and a half months? Last quarter of the journey.” 

Trit paused, her head emerging from the back of Kal’chei’s shoulder to prop on the top of it, nestling against her neck. Kal’chei could feel her doing sums in her head, her symbiont’s claws twitching on and off the skin somewhere on her torso. “Sounds about right. I don’t understand why they call this damn language Standard when nothing about it is standard, honestly. It’s all exceptions.” 

The aggrieved tone made Kal’chei laugh, rueful. “I know exactly what you mean, sister.” 

Trit nuzzled Kal’chei’s neck again at the term, then sank down, out of sight, spiraling around Kal’chei’s body, only the slightest tickle giving Kal’chei a clue of what she was doing. She stopped at the edge of their area, and Trit emerged from her leg and foot, front claws tapping against the floor, walking herself forward as the rest of her followed. 

“Follow me, we can compete on best forward roll!” 

Kal’chei rolled her eyes. “And who’s watching the computer then?” 

Trit’s stride hitched. “Oh, right.” She sounded disappointed, a slight hiss to her words.

“Tell you what, I’ll watch the computer, and you, then we can switch off?” 

“Hrm. Acceptable.” Trit curved about, returning to their joint station with a jump up the handholds, and Kal’chei followed a bit slower, having to pull her longer, heavier body, not suited to such large jumps. 

“All clear!” Trit called as Kal’chei made it to the top. “Now watch.”

Kal’chei laughed. “Yes, ma’am.” 

Trit’s tail flicked suspiciously at the term of respect, but her forward roll was magnificent. Kal’chei applauded, then quickly switched places. With no one else around to see, a little reversion to childhood antics never hurt.

*&*&*

E’tany snuggled into Chauth’s armpit, seeking warmth and familiarity. She pushed the arm wider and circled, cuddling up, base of her tail under Chauth’s hand.

Head turning sleepily, Chauth’s eyes opened to slits. “Hey, need something?” 

“No,” E’tany whispered, tongue flicking out, “just this.” 

“Alright then.” Chauth’s eyes drooped shut once again, but his arm moved to fit around his symbiont. 

When E’tany woke as their sleep cycle ended, footsteps hurrying past their door, and the alarm within a minute of going off. E’tany stepped carefully over her symbiont, and turned it off, then returned to the heavy figure. She crawled up to his face, situating herself right above him. She could easily drop on his exposed skin and become the surface-riding tattoo form she needed to survive, but first she meant to wake her partner. 

“Chaaaauth,” She hissed, flicking her tongue in his face, “time to rise, and shine…” She opened her jaws and blew out on his face. 

“Urgh,” Chauth coughed, raising a hand to shield himself from dragon morning-breath. “You’re a terrible symbiont.” 

E’tany laughed, gliding onto his skin, leaving her head poking out, like a seal treading water. “You love me.” 

“Stars only know why,” Chauth muttered, pushing himself up, but he stroked her head gently as they made their way towards the bathroom. Time to face another day. 


End file.
